Sausage peddlers were a common sight, but more so were the vagrants who
filled sixteenth-century Mediterranean cities. In Spain the ranks of the
picardia (rogue’s den), included vagrants, adventurers, beggars,
pickpockets, even students. They congregated in towns like Sanlúcar de
Barrameda. The thieves and tramps came from the dregs of Spanish society and,
when not robbing, looked for work and were naturally drawn to the ships heading
for the Indies.

As Spain entered its Golden Age in the late sixteenth century, brigandage
was on the rise. In Catalonia Cervantes described the road from Barcelona to
Saragossa as particularly dangerous, filled with as many bandoleros as
there were bandouliers in Languedoc. These bandits were like modern
guerilla bands, with the peasants on their side. Cities had to be careful when
expelling these dregs of society because they ended up in the countryside
robbing travelers. Seville rounded up all its vagabonds in October 1581 and
shipped them to the Americas, but they never made it: the four ships sunk in the
South Atlantic and a thousand vagabonds drowned.

The odd assortment of rogues in Spanish society during this period often
became characters in literature. The picaresque novel, derived from the word for
“rogue’s den,” saw the poor rascals become anti-heros. They were known as the
sopistas, the soup eaters living off the handouts of sopa boba at
monastery doors. Two of the earliest picaresque novels were the anonymous
Lazarillo de Tormes published in 1554 and Francisco de Quevedo’s La
Vida del Buscón written in 1608. These novels about the down-and-out
rascally youths are preoccupied with how to get food. In Lazarillo de
Tormes, poor Lazarillo works for an evil priest who gives him one onion
every four days. Lazarillo finds a tinkerer to make a copy of the key to the
priest’s bread box. But he can eat only mere crumbs, like a mouse, so he will
not be found out..

The huge number of vagabonds, and lack of strong central authority in
Italy, made it a bandit’s paradise, especially in Calabria, Sicily, Sardinia,
and Corsica. Behind all banditry was the specter of hunger. In Sicily the
exploits of the bandits were sung by the urvi, blind wandering minstrels
who played small violins. There were bandits in North Africa, too, where the
noble and ancient ghazwa, the razzia or military raid, became nothing
more than highway robbery. Turkey, too, eventually became infested with robbers.

Calabria, in southern Italy, was the most infamous for its bands of
cutthroats and bandits who committed the most horrifying crimes. They were
viciously repressed only to retaliate with ever greater audacity and ferocity.
They killed people in churches, raided castles, and entered the towns in
daylight. Bandits were often supported by their relatives living in the villages
who stored their food supply and provided shelter. Banditry continued in part
because one country delighted in the troubles of another and covertly supported
the bandits there. Whether Calabria’s rustic cuisine is attributable to its
rough historical precedents is an interesting question, but, of course, culinary
development doesn’t necessarily work that way. Contemporary rustic cuisine is
often an outgrowth of historic poverty.